Adaptec 2810SA problems

[Mark Overmeer <Mark@Overmeer.net>]

Hi all,

I bought an Adaptec 2810SA with 8x250GB disks last month (PCI card).
It ran for about one week, and then one disk got degraded.  I couldn't
get it to work again, it seemed, so replaced the disk. However, recovery
still doesn't work.

Now, when I start a 2.6.7 kernel, I get this: (line starts with only the
second, all within the same minute)

02:Attached scsi generic sg0 at scsi0, channel 0, id 0, lun 0,  type 0
03:st: Version 20040403, fixed bufsize 32768, s/g segs 256
33:aacraid: Host adapter reset request. SCSI hang ?
33: aacraid: Host adapter appears dead
33:scsi: Device offlined - not ready after error recovery: host 0 channel 0 id 0 lun 0
33:SCSI error : <0 0 0 0> return code = 0x6000000
33:end_request: I/O error, dev sda, sector 0
33:Unable to handle kernel NULL pointer dereference at virtual address 00000040
33: printing eip:
33:f8c5a0e7
33:*pde = 00000000
33:Oops: 0000 [#1]
33:SMP
33:Modules linked in: st sr_mod cdrom sg usbserial parport_pc lp parport md5 ipv6 button battery ac eth1394 uhci_hcd ehci_hcd usbcore raw1394 ohci1394 ieee1394 aacraid sd_mod scsi_mod xfs dm_mod 8250 serial_core sk98lin reiserfs
33:CPU:    0
33:EIP:    0060:[__crc_lock_sock+1007081/3098769]   Not tainted
33:EIP:    0060:[<f8c5a0e7>]    Not tainted
33:EFLAGS: 00010282   (2.6.7)
33:EIP is at aac_biosparm+0x95/0x173 [aacraid]
33:eax: 00000000   ebx: 00003ec1   ecx: 00000000 edx: f7fff480
33:esi: cc800080   edi: 00000000   ebp: f264bf4c esp: f264bf14
33:ds: 007b   es: 007b   ss: 0068
33:Process hwscan (pid: 6067, threadinfo=f264a000 task=f77680b0)
33:Stack: f71e8500 00000000 cc800080 00000000 f7ed7b94 bfffdca0 f77e0400 f71e8500
33:       f8c198d4 f77e0400 f71e8500 cc800080 00000000 f264bf4c 000000ff 0000003f
33:       0003423e f71e8500 f8c199c7 f71e856c bfffdca0 f7fa9d38 c021a638 f71e8500
33:Call Trace:
33: [__crc_lock_sock+742870/3098769] sd_hdio_getgeo+0x72/0x165 [sd_mod]
33: [<f8c198d4>] sd_hdio_getgeo+0x72/0x165 [sd_mod]
33: [__crc_lock_sock+743113/3098769] sd_ioctl+0x0/0x10e [sd_mod]
33: [<f8c199c7>] sd_ioctl+0x0/0x10e [sd_mod]
33: [blkdev_ioctl+165/1144] blkdev_ioctl+0xa5/0x478
33: [<c021a638>] blkdev_ioctl+0xa5/0x478
33: [block_ioctl+0/21] block_ioctl+0x0/0x15
33: [<c01615e6>] block_ioctl+0x0/0x15
33: [sys_ioctl+485/658] sys_ioctl+0x1e5/0x292
33: [syscall_call+7/11] syscall_call+0x7/0xb
33: [<c0105fd7>] syscall_call+0x7/0xb
33:Code: 66 81 78 40 55 aa 74 22 8b 54 24 0c 89 14 24 e8 af 94 4e c7

I have four questions:
  1) the kernel says:    aacraid: Host adapter appears dead
     Do you think that the controller is really dead, or how can I check
     that?  From BIOS, I can see the discs controlled by the card
  2) Would upgrading the firmware version 7211 to 7244 help in this
     situation?  Anyone experience with that.
  3) Can I upgrade the firmware using wine (it would be nice when
     adaptec would describe that procedure somewhere) or do I really
     need to boot DOS from floppy first?
  4) Probably there is a kernel bug when this exception situation is
     handled.

I hope someone can help me save the 500GB of data already on the disks.
-- 
Thanks in advance,

               MarkOv

------------------------------------------------------------------------
drs Mark A.C.J. Overmeer                                MARKOV Solutions
       Mark@Overmeer.net                          solutions@overmeer.net
http://Mark.Overmeer.net                   http://solutions.overmeer.net
-- 
Met vriendelijke groet,

               MarkOv

------------------------------------------------------------------------
drs Mark A.C.J. Overmeer                                MARKOV Solutions
       Mark@Overmeer.net                          solutions@overmeer.net
http://Mark.Overmeer.net                   http://solutions.overmeer.net